Atoning Sacrifice

I thought I’d post a few times today and tomorrow about the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ and what it means to me and to some of the authors and fictional and actual characters that I have on my bookshelves. I’m going to take turns blogging and house-cleaning and see how that goes.

Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a man must knock. Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son: ‘Ye were bought at a price’, and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us. Costly grace is the Incarnation of God. ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship.

He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world. I John 2:2.

I certainly can’t say anything more profound or meaningful than Dietrich Bonhoeffer has already said or put the gospel into words more succinct and pointed than than those John wrote in his first letter in Scripture. And I can’t sing like Chris Tomlin or Matt Redman.

But I can say with millions of saints who have gone before me that Jesus is my atoning sacrifice. I am called to follow Him, and it has cost me everything. Mostly it has cost me my pride and my self-satisfaction. I am bought with a price and I no longer belong to myself. Praise God! He takes my pitiful and sinful self, and He makes me into His adopted daughter. My sinful self is nailed to the cross with Jesus, and I am a new creature in Him.

No other religion or philosophy or god can claim the regenerative power that Jesus claims in the cross and the resurrection because no other religion or philosophy or god has paid the price that Jesus paid. What can your religion do for you except tell you to be good, sacrifice for your own sins, try harder, be better? What can your philosophy do besides exhort you to enjoy life while you can or stoically face suffering because you have no choice? What can your god do for you except provide an illusory and impermanent pleasure or distraction from the very real evil and suffering in this world?

Instead of all these things, Jesus tells me to follow Him and trust Him. I don’t have to try harder to be good or enjoy life or search for pleasure or even ignore suffering. I can rest in His atoning sacrifice and know that “He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all–how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” (Romans 8:32)

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

2 thoughts on “Atoning Sacrifice

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